Structural Materials Designing Laboratory, Yokohama National University (Professor Shoichi HIROSAWA)
The application of steels and non-ferrous materials (e.g. aluminum and magnesium alloys) over a wide range of structural components requires deep knowledge of relationship between the mechanical properties and microstructures. The alloy designing, process development and evaluation of various characteristics are conducted in this laboratory for fabricating new metallic materials with more excellent properties. The proposal of less environmentally damaging materials is also aimed to meet the demand from industries. The current topics of this laboratory are
(1)
Development of ultrafine-grained aluminum alloys without diminishing the excellent age-hardenability
(2)
Development of Al-Si die casting alloys for car air-conditioners with CO2 as a low global warming potential refrigerant
(3)
Development of Al-Mg-Si alloy sheets for automotive body panels with good age-hardenability even at lower bake-hardening temperatures
(4)
Development of more heat-resistant Al-Mn alloy sheets for heat-exchangers of automotives
(5)
Prediction of microstructural change during hot-rolling of direct-chill (DC) cast aluminum alloys by finite-element method (FEM)
(6)
Nano-scale characterization of microstructures of aluminum based metallic
glasses
(7)
High strengthening of low-alloy steels with impurity copper inevitably mixed during recycling process.
Fig.1
High resolution transmission electron microscopy (HRTEM) image (a) and FFT spectra (b)(c) obtained from two different regions of a melt-spun Al90Ni3Gd7 metallic glass. Faint spots in (c) originate from nanocrystalline α-Al particles.
Fig.2
Typical three-dimensional atom probe (3DAP) map of various elemental atoms around a Cu-rich cluster formed in a low alloy steel.
